Satan: The First Influencer | Kingsmen

Welcome to the Kingsman Podcast. I'm your host, John Moffitt, and the pastor of Grace Reformed Church in Spring Hill, Tennessee. I'm also the host of Theocast, a weekly podcast about Reformed theology, and on this podcast we're trying to help explain what does it look like to live in the kingdom of God for the King and enjoying all of his benefits while we await his return, and that is where we're gonna pick up this week as well.

One of the aspects I love about this podcast is I want to help us find the true and sincere rest that our King offers, and there are warning passages that are literally red flashing lights that say, beware, because this will trip you up, right?

You know, I think that when you go—I use this illustration on Sunday, and I got it from another pastor—but when you go to a zoo, you're there to enjoy yourself. That's really why you're there, right? To see the sights.

But throughout the entire zoo, they have paths, they have fences, they have signs, and those signs are designed to make sure your involvement at the zoo, you walk home with all your limbs and all your children.

That's what they're there for, right? And so when you walk over to the lion's den and you see the—right there, don't feed the lion, or it says don't put your fingers in the cage, or the big sign, don't go in the cage.

Why? Because of the danger that is lurking for us. Now, we often live our life this way, as if we're in a zoo, and everything's—as long as you follow the rules and you stay on the path, then there's no danger, and you'll be fine.

If you're dumb and you're a criminal, then there's danger for you. That's not how this works. Not at all, because the way in which the Bible describes our experience of the Christian life is that we're constantly living in danger, so much so, God wraps us in bubble wrap.

He calls it the spiritual armor of God, which we're going to get into soon. But what I want to talk about is the realities that we live in, kind of continue the conversation, that if we were to use that entire scenario, being at the zoo, there is no cage for the lion.

There is none. He's out of the cage, and there's signs everywhere saying beware, because there is lurking behind every bush and behind every building, the potential of you being taken out. Listen to his roar, watch for his—this is the language that Peter gives to us.

And unfortunately, we don't understand what he's doing, and therefore we don't understand the influence of it. As the podcast says, Satan, the first influencer, this is something that I've been trying to track down, not trying to use a pun there with animals, but I've been trying to research and understand from a biblical standpoint of how is it that Satan influences us.

We don't really, I think, contemplate that very often. We think that, well, you can't talk to me, or I don't have a demonic possession. We don't know what to do with it, which is a great tactic of an adversary or enemy is to make sure that you don't know where he's at and you don't know what he's doing as long as you're under his influence.

The Bible has a lot of warning passages, and it explains the differences between godliness and worldliness. And both of those words, unfortunately, are kind of a bad taste in our mouth. We hate worldliness, but we don't really know what it means.

And godliness, we cringe from that because of unfortunate legalistic backgrounds for some of us, or it's been used in a hypocritical way where people judge us for things that they shouldn't be judging us.

And so when the Bible talks about these words like worldliness, that if you're a friend of the world, you're an enemy of God, we don't even know what to do with those passages. So I want to give a great definition that I read recently by David Wells, and he described worldliness this way.

He says, worldliness makes sin look normal, and righteousness seems strange. Now, this makes sense because really he's given the explanation of Jesus when he says, if the world hates you, it hated me first.

Why? Because I'm exposing one to the religious elite, I'm exposing the falsehood of their religion, and to the sinner, I'm exposing their sin because I am the righteousness of God. I am God. And so he says, don't be surprised if you live by my name and you uphold my righteousness that the world's going to hate you.

It's going to. So with that in mind, I think it's important, there are stark warnings against the difference between you can't live in both worlds and have both worlds affirm you. It can't happen. So I want to look at this as an example in the book of James, something I preached recently.

This is also related to a sermon I had preached recently. We'll put it in the notes as well on living with spiritual eyes in this world. If we are in danger, there is something lurking and it's influencing us.

The question is, how is it influencing us? You know, the title of it saying that Satan is the first influencer. Well, Satan influenced Eve, right? And what did he use? He used logic and he enticed her flesh and he enticed her pride, that she could become like God as powerful as he is, right?

Well, this same tactic is still being used. Often we don't know how to answer the question, how is Satan influencing us? James assumes he is because he says resist him, resist Satan. So how do you resist Satan is the question, right?

There has to be a way in doing that. And when you look at all of scripture and even in modern day life, Satan uses people. That's what he does. He influences people who then influence people. If you know anything about debt or about the internet, we live in Nashville and in Nashville Dave Ramsey lives here.

And all I have to say is debt is bad. And I say, who said that? You know, the most famous person in our day, everybody would say Dave Ramsey, especially here in the I've never had a conversation. I've never met him, but there's the influence of what I've heard him say, right?

And that is the same way in which Satan, Lucifer has influenced people throughout thousands of years. And that influence is enticing our flesh. It's drawing us towards worldliness. Here's an example of worldliness in our day.

Remember the quote, it's to take that which is sinful and make it normal and that which is righteous and make it strange. Let's just think about intimacy before marriage. That's normal. It's normal in music.

It's normal entertainment. It's normal in social media. People living together is in union as if they were married, but are not, is a direct violation of Christ and of scripture. We can think about same-sex attractions, same-sex marriages, abortion.

We celebrate abortion as the freedom of the person. We literally are celebrating the murder of babies and we've been doing it for years. That is a great example of worldliness. You cannot agree with the world on this.

And at the same time, say that you're of Christ because the two are not, God hates people being murdered. So if you're having people over here who agree with abortion and they're accepting you, even though you're, they're not going to accept you.

I think this is what I think is, whenever you oppose somebody, what do they say to you? You know, they start calling you a bigot, a racist. They hate speech, right? You start saying that two genders are not supposed to be married to each other.

They literally say, okay, that's hate speech, which I think in America, we're going to start feeling this in churches very soon. I think podcasts like this and YouTube channels are going to start being censored in those ways.

Why? Because righteousness is seen as strange. We would say that's righteousness and they would say the opposite and they were, they're taking sin and they're making it normal. But Satan is doing that to us as well.

Okay, maybe you who are listening to this aren't struggling with those particular sins and you would agree with everything that I'm saying, but we can easily buy into selfishness and laziness where we become judgmental of other people.

We allow our flesh to be enticed. Let me read you a passage of scripture where Paul or James is expressing what happens when worldliness has come into the heart. So he says it this way. This is James 4 .1.

What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? So he's saying you have two people who are fighting against each other and they can't come to an agreement.

Why? Because their sinful desires, everyone's desires are different and at different varying levels. So there's nothing that unifies them. The first three chapters, James has given them a lot of reasons of why Christ can unify them in the way that they spend their money, their time, and the way in which they treat each other.

It's like you should not be creating a caste system within the church. So now he's dealing with it and saying, do you know why you're fighting? He goes on to say, you desire and you do not have. So you're desiring something you're not supposed to have.

That's his point. That's worldliness, right? So you murder, you covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and you quarrel. You do not have because you do not ask. And when you do ask, you do not receive because you ask wrongly to spend it upon your passions.

So this entire influence is that what would be opposite of Christ, right? So he goes on to say this, you adulterous people, do you not... So adulterous literally means to sell yourself off. You belong, you're in a marriage covenant and you have taken your body and you've given it to someone else.

You adulterous people, do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore, whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Well, you can't play both fields here.

That's his point. What James says next to me has been helpful because he explains where this comes from. He explains how this happened. Do you suppose it is not through the purpose that the scripture says he yearns more jealously over the spirit that he who has make to dwell inside of you, but he gives more grace.

I love this. He gives more grace. He uses grace as the motivation for repentance, not fear, not dread, but he gives more grace. Therefore, it says God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.

Here it is. Please come back. Please repent. Turn away from these passions. Turn away from this worldliness. Do not be a part of this. And it's because of grace that you can do this. But how did you get here in the first place?

It's because you decided to submit to Satan and not to God. Listen to the verse. Submit yourselves therefore to God, resist the devil and he will flee from you. The reason for the quarreling is the influence of Satan.

That's right there in the text. He's like, if you can resist the worldly ideologies, the world's influence, that's causing your passion within you to war against others and you submit to the grace of God.

I love this. He says, but there's more grace and that's what you're submitting to. You're submitting to a gracious and kind and loving, merciful God, not out of fear, right? But out of the joy of being set free from these passions that don't benefit you.

This is what I think is fascinating about sin. It never advertises its punishments, its consequences. It never advertises its consequences. You see medication advertisements on TV and here's all the side effects.

Satan doesn't go, here, go be unfaithful with your wife and here are all the consequences. He never says that. And he says, it will feel good and she will love you and she will care for you. And it's all the lies of the benefits over and over again, but never the consequences.

And grace is that which covers your sin and says, now you submitted to worldliness, which is the influence of Satan and look what it produced, fighting and quarreling and murdering. But if you submit to God, what does it produce?

Meekness and joy and patience and love. To me, that's so encouraging. So does it matter that we walk around wondering what's influencing my heart with worldliness? Yes. Yes, it matters. Because James just shows you what happens when you don't take every thought captive, when you aren't careful, when we don't obey Romans 12, when it says, be renewing your mind, because your mind is what controls your emotions and your emotions will control your actions.

And this is how it flows. So when he says, submit yourself, that means, uh, just to be frank, when you look at scripture, if you're submitting yourselves to God and his word, you're going to be seen as strange.

This is the quote from, uh, Wells, right? Righteousness seems strange. Uh, Paul says it this way, that those who are perishing when we, when they hear the gospel, they call it foolish. Well, that's foolish.

That's weird. And the concept, he says that they're going to hate you. That's normal. What you have to look at it is that these are caged animals who are starving and have no idea what they're doing. And you're the only one who's free.

Now you can be taken out by that same animal that caged them, or you can continue to submit to God being set free from that and be able to then set them free from their cage as well. And no one can do that if they're first in prison themselves, they can't.

And so this is why we have to constantly be submitting. I love that word, submit. Now before, I don't like the word submit. Nobody likes the word submit. You know, even when Paul says wives should submit to their husbands, we're like, ah.

But when you think about where it's coming from, he's like a God of grace who has promised you the power of his own strength. You stand in the strength of the Lord. Literally, Paul says, stand in the strength of the Lord.

I think I could submit to that. You know, I will get inside that. That sounds great to me because it comes to me with mercy and grace. So my encouragement to all of us who are listening to this podcast, you have to live every single day wondering, is this influencing me to submit to my Lord in the grace of God that he has given to me?

Or am I going to be submitting to the flesh, which is worldliness, embracing something that will create a passion in me that is the opposition to my God? I'll just say it to you this way. 1 John's overly clear.

He said, you cannot love the world and love God. You can't do it because worldliness, which is just examples that I gave you, they're so opposed to him. And so if you find your heart being drawn towards worldliness, things that you know that are deviant against God, you need to step back and go, where's he at?

Where's he influencing me? Is it in media? Is it in music? Is it in friendships? Is it in something I'm reading? Or is it the lack of that? Am I not renewing my mind? Is my flesh taking over? Have I become lazy?

Have I allowed some other priority to take place? Remember, not because we want our lives to look strange. They're going to be strange because worldliness will not dictate the way we live. Christ does.

Therefore, we are what? Aliens. And aliens don't fit, right? We're sojourners. We're just passing through, and this is the way we live our life. I just want to encourage you with that to open your eyes and look for the danger so that you can have the joy of resting in Christ and leading others to rest in Christ as well.

I hope this was encouraging to you, and Lord willing, we'll see you next week.